It’s getting warm, time to get active! Five yummy things you need for a picnic in Kyoto

Planning on having a picnic in Kyoto? You cannot miss these five shops! Enjoy a relaxing picnic in Kyoto!

If the weather is nice, you can see many people preparing their picnic-feasts by the Kamo River, and in both Maruyama Park and Imperial Palace Park. Most Japanese people ready their delectable picnic treats at home, but it’s easy for foreign tourists to Kyoto to also buy some very nice treats to be had at a picnic. So get some Japanese snacks and desserts, a cup of coffee or juice, and come join me for a picnic! These five shops are conveniently located; some of them even close to the Kamo River. I guarantee to you, if you have a picnic by the river, you’ll truly fall in love with this ancient city!

1Grandir OikeGrandir Oike is close to the Kyoto City Hall, and it’s cool and chic in black, very much like the bakeries of Europe. The view inside through the glass windows has a mysterious feel to it.

This bakery is most famous for its bagels. There are many different types of bagels on offer, with cheese and without, and even chocolate and blueberry tasting ones too.

They have a good selection of such classics as croissants, but they also have many other types of European bread on sale. Everything is baked at the bakery, so you get fresh bread right off the oven here. This is why this popular little bakery is often full of people. So get a sandwich and some bread and let’s go for a picnic!

Close to the shopping street of Teramachi, you can find a little shop specializing in mashed potato of many types. What’s most special about the mashed potato here, is that even the bowl it’s served in and the spoon can be eaten too. How ecological!

The mashed potato is put into a pie-like bowl, and then its topped with some very delicious-looking cheese. Just seeing the slowly melting cheese is enough to make one feel famished!

In the picture, you can see mashed potato topped with tacos ingredients, raclette cheese, white miso, and mentaiko (spicy cod roe). They even have healthy smoothies, so by getting your picnic-grub here, it will not only be delicious but also healthy and ecological!

Demachi Futaba is a traditional shop specializing in wagashi, a category of Japanese sweets with hundreds of years of history behind it. This shop is so popular that there is always a line in front of it, and although it’s already been 100 years since the foundation of this shop, the people of Kyoto can’t seem to get enough of Demachi Futaba’s wagashi. Note that the best-before-date on wagashi is very short.

Demachi Futaba is most famous for its mame-daifuku, which has just the right amount of sweetness of it stand out even more. The texture is very soft, but the red beans make it very interesting. The red bean paste inside it is not too sweet.

But they of course have many other types of sweets on sale too, like kurimochi (contains chestnut), kusa-daifuku (mochi containing endo-beans), and ohagi (glutinous rice covered with red bean paste). Because their sweets are handmade, I recommend having them on the day you buy them, otherwise, they might get hard.

Fukueido is located on Shijo Street, and it has 80-years of history behind its sweets. The bright, clean look of the shop has an air of elegance to it, just as expected of Gion.

Their dango-balls are made of sweet red bean paste and have a rice dumpling in the middle. The dumplings are said to resemble the Moon, and they’re actually named just this – they’re known as “The Moon of Gion.” The size is just right, one bite for one dango.

They also offer matcha anmitsu jelly with a sticky rice ball on top. If you top this with condensed milk, it becomes an even better tasting treat. It’s very conveniently packaged, so you could have this pretty much anywhere! Afternoon tea with jelly, anyone?

Weather permitting, there’s no better way to enjoy Kyoto than going on a picnic! Get a cup of coffee, and sit down and enjoy the beautiful Kyoto-scenery. I’m sure you’ll feel incredibly refreshed! I’m sure that this will become a very nice memory of your travels to Kyoto. But be careful of crows and other birds when you’re having your picnic!